Love a Nightingale
by Jounouchi Kun Joey
Summary: After a chance encounter, Seto Kaiba is determined to find out what makes Hiroto Honda so different from himself. In doing so he finds what it is he has been missing his whole life. Stubbornshipping (HHxSK) fic!
1. The End of All Things

**A/N:** You shall all be converted to my evil ways :)! Well, I'm going to try and convert you at any rate. I'm going to try very hard to keep everyone in character. It might be difficult, seeing as how I normally try and ignore Kaiba, but I will make an honest attempt.

I am going to begin at the end of the story, tell the story as a memory, and hopefully end up where I began. If Kaiba seems a bit OOC in the beginning, it is because that is the point I want him to end up at, so that he isn't really. I'm planning on around twenty chapters, maybe less. Hopefully less, 'cause that's a lot, lol. This also takes place after the end of the series so, no Yamis or items. Very sad.

By way of explanation about the title: This story was partially inspired by the poem "Ode to a Nightingale" by the romantic poet Keats. It is to tribute this that I gave this story the title that I did.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own the characters. I merely twist them.

**Warnings:** This is a stubbornshipping (Honda x Kaiba) fic the only one I know of. That means it is Yaoi. Don't like it? Don't read it.

**Dedications:** To **_Love Alchemist_**, simply because she's the best Yu-Gi-Oh Yaoi writer I can find.

**Authoress:** JKJ

**Title:** The Love of a Nightingale

**Prologue:** The End of all Things

* * *

"_Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail,_

_That brings our friends up from the underworld,_

_Sad as the last which reddens over one,_

_That sinks with all we love below the verge;_

_So sad, so fresh, the days that are no more."_

"Tears, Idle Tears", Alfred, Lord Tennyson

* * *

Dark charcoal clouds hung low over Domino City, covering everything in an eerie dark light. It had been raining earlier, though at the moment it had seemed to subside, and everything was glistening and wet, its colors brighter.

The grass in the city's graveyard was a brighter green than usual, its many headstone glistening ebony and the trees looking like twisted hands reaching heavenward to welcome the tears of the angels.

A handful of figures cloaked in black could be seen making their way away from the last of a funeral. A boy with red and black hair and purple eyes watching his feet, a brown haired girl beside him with blue eyes full of tears, and a white haired boy with a sad face all were among the group walking away from the slick black coffin. There remained by the open grave only three figures.

They stood with one on the left side of the grave and two on the right. The one on the left was a blond boy with amber eyes that looked almost dejected as he stared at the casket. He looked at the reflection he saw there, a mirror of himself right down the hands in the pockets of the worn suit he was wearing, for only a moment before he looked across the wreath of blue flowers to the other two funeral attendees.

They stood hand in hand, one shorter than the other, and anyone looking at them could tell immediately that they were brothers despite their obvious physical differences. The younger of the two, with long black hair and tear filled grey eyes, wasn't looking at the coffin. He was looking away, after the others who had just parted their company. Beside him stood his brother, a tall brunette who was currently using his bangs to hide his cobalt eyes so that no one could see the pain there.

They remained in silence, all three standing as still as the headstones around them, before the brunette spoke.

"Mokuba, go wait in the car."

"Niisama," the younger boy whispered, "are you sure?"

A slight nod and the grey eyed boy turned and walked away. He looked back over his shoulder once, and his eyes meet with the amber ones of the boy across from his brother. The blond sent him a weak smile which Mokuba returned before he continued on toward the limo waiting at the graveyard entrance.

Neither of the two remaining spoke right away. It seemed that both had lost something dear, but didn't know how to express to the other that they understood. Finally the blond spoke, even though he didn't look over the casket again.

"Jerk," he said in an almost teasing tone. Blue eyes looked up through bangs, and an almost smile played upon pale lips.

"Puppy," was the reply, though it lacked malice or anger. The two taunts seemed more to be a ritual between the two boys, as common as saying hello to anyone else.

The blond sighed and ran a hand through his hair, sad eyes resting on the casket. "You," he whispered across the black coffin, "were perhaps the only person who loved him more than I did."

To that the brunette did not respond right away. Cerulean eyes looked sadly upon the coffin, and one strong looking hand clenched by his side. The other male didn't watch him, instead looking at his feet. Suddenly, he began to laugh softly.

"What?" The brunette asked with only a slight resentment in his voice.

"Who would have thought it," the blond answered in an almost sad voice, "you and me mourning the loss of the same person? I always thought our hate would be to strong for that."

A corner of the brunette's mouth did twitch, although he didn't laugh. In a soft voice he said, "he did."

The blond boy didn't answer, though he smiled slightly to himself. "He always believed there was some good in you."

"I'm glad of that," the brunette whispered. Nothing else was said between the two, and after a few minutes the blond walked around the coffin and toward the exit. He paused as he passed the other male, laying a hand on his shoulder that expressed their mutual grief, before walking away. His hands remained in his pockets and he didn't look back.

The brown haired boy remained, emotionless eyes staring at the casket as rain once again began to drizzle down. The wind began to blow and dark strands moved across the young man's forehead as he whispered, "you left to soon, my own. I need you still."

He didn't cry, he never had, but inside he yearned for the only one who had ever seen him as human. The only one he had ever truly loved. He looked up at the stormy sky, allowing the drops to land on his face.

"It's fitting," he whispered to the sky, closing his eyes, "that it is raining now, here at the end of all things, when it was raining at the beginning." He allowed his mind to slip away, back to when it began. Back to before all this mess of being in love started. Back to before he'd found the key to his heart.


	2. Chance Encounters

**A/N:** Now the story begins! Nahahaha! This chapter contains some mild spoilers to the end of the series, but because this isn't a story about that they aren't major or anything. I also realized on itty-bitty but very annoying mistake. Kaiba and Mokuba are supposed to be in America hits head against wall. However, it seems that the animators forgot this detail to when they did the Bakura VS Kaiba duel in the AE arc so…I'm going to pretend they came back to Japan for some reason.

**Title:** Love a Nightingale

**Chapter 1:** Chance Encounters

* * *

"_A person often meets his destiny on the road he took to avoid it."_ -Jean de La Fontaine

* * *

Seto Kaiba sat in his limo waiting not so patiently for his little brother to emerge from school. Mokuba was delaying…again. Seto was sure his little brother thought that if he took long enough to come out he would be left behind, and then be forced to walk with his friends.

That, of course, would never happen. Leave his little brother to walk the city alone when he was oh so kidnappable? The CEO didn't think so. Especially not today when it was raining like someone had poked a hole in the sky. No, Seto would sit there until Mokuba came out if it meant he would be waiting clear into tomorrow.

Usually Kaiba used this time to work on either his homework or his company, but today he couldn't seem to focus on it. He could blame the late March air if he wanted to, but that wasn't logical and Seto Kaiba was a man of logic. No, he would just have accept the fact that it was not his day for concentrating. Instead he sat and watched the water slide down the very expensive tinting on his windows.

The day had been wet from the beginning, but other than that nothing of notice had really happened. He'd gone to school as usual. He had pestered Yuugi and his friends, as usual. Nothing out of the ordinary or worth his wasting brainpower on.

He noticed that Mokuba had now left the building, and his cobalt eyes followed him somewhat listlessly. His younger brother was a walking, arm over his head to protect them from the rain, to the light he would have to use to cross the busy street in front of his school. Seto also noticed, for no particular reason that some boys were walking up behind him.

He became much more concerned, however, when one of the boys began to push his younger brother toward the bridge the school was next to. On a normal day the water below was shallow and calm, but today it was a raging torrent. He barked something at his driver, he wasn't sure what, as he climbed out of the car. He would go help his brother and see what it was that those boys wanted.

Even he, however, could not magically make the light change. All his power and money couldn't stop the traffic, and even he realized he'd be very little use to Mokuba if he were dead. Momentarily out of options, the teenage CEO could only watch as the boys circled his brother so they were on three sides and the barrier of the bridge was on the remaining one. He couldn't hear what they were saying over the wind, but he was sure they were taunting him because of the angry tears that had now sprang into his younger brother's eyes.

Anger boiled within in him, and Seto took a step toward the edge of the street, ready to stride across in all his intimidating glory the moment the light changed. Then everything began to happen at once. Someone Seto thought he should know, but couldn't quite place, began to move toward the boys. The light changed just as they took a step, and as Seto stepped out into the street what he had feared happened. One of the boys gave his brother a shove that was hard enough to send him stumbling backward. The railing was low enough for him to tumble over but high enough for him to hit his head on as he tumbled over. The dark haired young boy tumbled into the water and, with panicked looks, the young boys scattered.

Seto, to angry and to worried to care how dignified he looked now, began to run across the street. "Mokuba!"

The person already over there, the one Seto felt he should know, was faster. There was a flash of brown, black, and white before whoever it was jumped over the railing and into the swirling cold water in a perfect dive. The brunette millionaire reached the edge of the bridge just in time to see black shoes disappear under the water.

"Mokuba!" He yelled again though he was not really sure why; it made him feel better anyway. Blue eyes searched frantically for a way down, as jumping in had obviously been taken care off, when two heads appeared above the water slightly to the left of where the shoes had disappeared.

One he recognized instantly as his brother's being held up by whom he now recognized, dimly in some dark corner of his mind, as one of Yuugi's friends. Honda he believed his name to be, though he wasn't sure. He knew that he, or his body anyway, had once kidnapped Mokuba but on an earlier occasion he had saved Mokuba, or Mokuba's body, from the dark Bakura. Funny how he still couldn't remember his name after all that.

He followed their progress toward the bank, where the other teenager pulled Mokuba from the water with him and carried him up to where his brother was waiting. Seto eyed him up and down as walked the last few steps. The soaking clothes revealed his muscular frame, and he was shivering with the cold. He was also panting, having had to swim against the current in order to bring Mokuba to safety.

"Here," he said, placing Mokuba in Seto's arm. Seto felt he should thank him, but he'd never thanked anyone of anything in his life. He didn't really know how to do it, even if he'd wanted to.

Instead he opted for a grunt followed by, "how much do you want for your troubles?"

"What?" Hazel eyes stared at him as one arced eyebrow raised. Seto got the distinct impression this friend of Yuugi's thought him nuts.

"You had to do this for a reason, and I will gladly reward you for it. How much do you want?" The CEO spoke as if speaking to a stupid person.

Honda growled almost imperceptibly at being spoken to as such before stating, "I don't want your money."

"What do you want then? Name it, it's yours."

"I didn't do it for a reward," the hazel eyed teen growled, "or for fame. And I especially didn't do it for you."

"What did you do it for then?" Seto shot back. He knew people. He knew they always had selfish motives behind what they did. He would just have to find this boy's. This protector of the Duel Monster's Champion. His own blue eyes narrowed at the boy as he ignored cries of 'Kaiba-sama' from his driver who was making his way over with the limo.

"I did it because it was the right thing to do, Kaiba. I couldn't just let him drown while you tried to get your rich ass across the street in time. I don't want your money. You can keep it. I just did it because someone had to."

Kaiba looked him in the face, eyes narrowed to almost slits. He seemed sincere enough, but there was always a selfish motive behind everything anyone did. Always. It was then that Seto noticed something that made his blood boil. There was pity in the hazel irises that were looking so coolly at him now. This nobody pitied him, and if there was emotion Seto could not stand to have directed at him it was pity. He could deal with hate, with anger, with envy. He could not handle pity.

"You will accept a ride home." He deliberately didn't word it as a question, because it wasn't. He hated having a debt almost as much as he hated being pitied, and he would not have one person get both those victories over him. Seeing no reason or way to object, Honda shrugged and followed him into the limo.

Hazel eyes followed the other teen, even as he gave directions to his home to the driver, as Seto lay his brother down on the seat across from the one they would be occupying. He watched him strip off his customary trench coat and lay it on top of his brother to stifle the cold, before he came and sat down next to him.

The rest of the ride was a silent and awkward one. Honda wasn't naturally a conversationalist, and he had a feeling Kaiba wouldn't have talked to him even if he'd wanted to. For his part, Seto felt he was repaying his debt plenty by giving this follower of Yuugi a ride home. There was no need for him to stretch his social boundaries with mere conversation.

Honda's directions led them to an apartment complex that was somewhere between middle and lower class. It was simple enough, white walls with a red tile roof, and looked to good to be for those who lived in poverty but to shabby to be for those who lived comfortably either.

"Thanks for the ride. Tell Mokuba to be more careful next time," was all that was said by way of parting. Kaiba simply grunted in response. The door shut and he walked into the building, pushing open the sliding glass door of the bottom apartment. Seto was sure that would be the end of it.

He could not, however, get the look out of his head. The look of pity. Not the hatred of his friend Jounouchi, not the anger of Anzu when he had once again belittled their friendship. It was open, unabashed, pity and it was aimed at him. This person who had so recently lost a friend pitied him. This boy with no name, no glory, and certainly nothing that Seto could think of that made him special pitied him.

The CEO was so angry that if the driver had looked in his rear view mirror he might have seen steam coming out of his ears. What gave that nobody the right to pity him, Seto Kaiba? He was everything that boy wasn't. Everyone knew his name; he had money, a company, and worldwide fame. Seto was willing to bet that if he asked everyone in his grade that seventy five percent of them wouldn't be able to tell him that boy's name.

So what gave him the right to pity him? That was the question that was driving Seto insane, plaguing him in a way that nothing had since Yuugi had defeated him that first time. He watched without really seeing Mokuba roll over, obviously alive and fine other than a nasty bump on the head. He was going to have to find out where this boy got the idea that he had the right to pity him. He had to.


End file.
